‘I said it was up to ya ma. She was cryin and said of course she’d forgive him. We cracked a couple of bottles of beer and we’ve been friends ever since. Through thick and thin. Hatred gets ya nowhere, bubby. I thought we’d taught you that.
‘Big Jim felt bad too. But he took to the drink until he got married. Even then it took a few years for him to say he was sorry. They were the only two that did. None of the other boys did. But we didn’t and we still don’t need em in our lives, bubby.’
Bess stood up and taking Vic’s hand said, ‘It’s time we was goin to bed. You need time to think things through, bub. Just remember, me and ya father had the best marriage. We wouldn’t change a thing. A lot of women never find the measure of their men. I saw his the minute I met him. It doesn’t matter how we met. What matters is that we met.’
Della sat in the dark for a long time after. I sat there with her, just holdin her hand. Hot, salty tears were soaking her face and dampening the crisp, white cotton of her party dress. She couldn’t get over what had happened and kept askin why.
She felt angry that her beautiful mother had gone through such brutality. And worse, it had been at the hands of men she had known and trusted all her life. She asked me how she could look at them in the same way anymore. I reckoned I didn’t know.
Then she felt a strong hand on her shoulder and looked up at the sad face of her husband.
‘You heard?’ she asked.
‘Yeh. Let it go, Dell. It was their decision to forgive. It’s nothing to do with you.’
Della told me the next day that she wanted to scream at him. Ask him if he could understand how she felt. But in her heart she knew that he was right. Anger was their prerogative, not hers. She wiped the tears from her eyes with the hem of her dress, took his hand and said, ‘Let’s go to bed. It’s been a long night.’
I reckoned it had.
Ma and Dad’s big trip
Me Ma and Dad went on the Indian Pacific and the Ghan up to Alice Springs. It was first class all the way.
They had a fancy cabin and they ate all their meals in the flash dinin room. All the way from home to Alice and back again they was drinkin top shelf grog and there was a chef preparin four-star tucker. Most of it looked just like that food ya see in them flash magazines or on them cookin shows on the telly.
Anyway, after a coupla days, Ma got sick of eatin all that fine food. Hated all the sauces and the way they stacked everything up. She used to git wild when they put her meat on top of the chips. ‘What stupid bastard come up with that idea? Don’t they know it makes the chips soggy?’ She reckoned the tucker was so fancy ya couldn’t tell what the fuck you was eatin half the time.
Anyway, this day she’s had a gutful so when the waiter comes up and asks em what they was havin for lunch, Dad orders up fancy like a big man. Then the waiter turns to Ma and says, ‘And what would madam like to eat today?’
Ma looks up at him and says in her sweetest voice, ‘Well, ya know, I wouldn mind havin somethin nice and simple. You know, like chops, tomato and some lettuce.’
The waiter looks at Ma. ‘I’ll see what I can do, Mrs Harris. I can’t promise anything, but I’m sure our chef would only be too happy to accommodate you.’
‘I’m sorry to be a nuisance,’ Ma replies, ‘but I would appreciate it, luv.’
So the waiter comes back with the tucker. He’s got Dad’s fancy feed of Veal Provencale with herb and cream noodles and a warm side salad. And for Ma he’s got a rack of lamb, some cherry tomatoes and a handful of rocket. He bungs it down in front of her with a flourish.
‘There you go, Mrs Harris. I think you’ll enjoy that.’
After the waiter leaves, Ma looks down at the tucker in disgust and starts pokin at it and movin it round on er plate.
‘Look at the size of these fuckin tomatoes, will ya?’ she says to Dad. ‘And what kinda lettuce is this supposed ta be?’
‘I dunno, Beryl. Anyway, stop makin a fuss and eat the fuckin thing.’
‘I don’t think I will,’ Ma reckons. ‘I mean, Roy, we paid a lotta money to come on this trip. Ya think they could serve up some decent size tomatoes. And another thing,’ she says, turnin the racks of lamb this way and that, ‘would it have killed em to cut up the chops?’
One time, on the trip they took to Alice, Ma and Dad decide to go and visit Coober Pedy. They visit all the underground museums and shops. They fossick for opals and drink beer in the pub and mingle with the locals.
One fulla asks Ma if she and Dad was gunna stay in the underground hotel for the night.
No way, Ma reckons. She’s gunna have to spend the rest of her life underground when she’s dead.
Shoppin with Aunty Pearlie
Aunty Pearlie, Dad’s sister, is one of those flash blackfullas. Always goin on bout what a good name she has. Always sayin stuff like, ‘Everyone respects me in this town. When I walk up the street they say, “Hello, Mrs Johnson. How are you today?” I always say, “Good thanks, love. Thanks for asking.” It doesn’t cost anything to be polite.’
Aunty Pearlie always gits dressed up to the nines in flowery dresses, stockins and shoes. Even if she’s just goin down the street for a pint of milk. She’s a big woman with long grey hair she wears in a plait. She’s as black as can be, but she always wears a hat when she goes out. If it’s the middle of summer, she takes an umbrella to keep the sun off her. She loves a yarn too, does Aunty. Dad reckons she’s the greatest lug basher around. Reckons she could talk a dog off a meat wagon.
Aunty Pearlie’s always goin on about doin things proper, includin speakin. Trouble is, she gits fucked up all the time. One time she was whingin to Dad about how expensive Old Billy Sullivan the butcher was. She was goin on about the price of this and the price of that. Then she says, ‘You know what, brother?’
‘What, Sister Pearl?’ says Dad, rollin his eyes.
‘That bandit had the cheek to charge me ten dollars for a kilometre’s worth of sausages!’
We still laugh over that one.
She’s always goin on at us bout the way we talk. She hates us sayin ‘blackfullas’. Reckons it’s ‘blackfellows’. And anyway, she reckons we shouldn’t call ourselves that. ‘We’re Aborigines’, she says. She’s always correctin us for sayin ‘nothin’ and ‘somethin and ‘goin’. She says, ‘It’s ‘nothing’, ‘something’, ‘going’.’
She tries to get us to repeat those words with her. We do cos it makes her happy and it makes Dad laugh. He reckons he don’t know how she got to be so flash. Reckons she watched too many Greer Garson and Katherine Hepburn movies when she was a kid.
Even her dog, Missy, is flash. She’s white and fluffy as can be. All the other dogs round the place are covered in red dust, but you don’t see a speck on Missy. She’s mean though. Our mutt Fleabag don’t like her. She towelled him up proper when we was visitin a couple of years ago. Now, he crosses the road whenever he sees her comin, and when we visit Aunty Pearlie he stays outside, under a tree if it’s hot, or in the car if it’s cold. Dad used ta reckon Flea was weak as piss for lettin Missy stand over him. Then she gives his dog Humbug a tune-up. Now Humbug sits outside with Flea and Dad don’t say nothin.
One thing Aunty Pearlie loves to do is go down to old Clarrie Barraclough’s store every pension day to do her shoppin. It’s the only store in town. One side is the grocery and hardware part. Old Clarrie runs that. The other side is where you buy clothes, presents, material and stuff and old Mrs Garraway, or Mrs G as everyone calls her, runs that. After Aunty’s bought groceries out the front, she goes out the back for a yarn with old Mrs G and to buy stuff like new hankies, or tea towels or presents for someone or other.
Aunty Pearlie reckons Mrs Garraway is a real lady and even though they’ve only ever spoken in the store, Aunty likes to think of her as a friend. Always goin on about them havin so much in common, both of em bein widows and all.
Aunty’s been a widow for a few years now. Uncle Dave just up and died one day. He was watchin a vide
o of Bonanza on the telly and pretendin to listen to Aunty. She reckons she asked im if he was ready for his supper and he didn’t answer. She reckon she got wild with him for not listenin to her when she was speaking and when she leant over to yell at im, she realised he was dead. Dad reckons Aunty talked the poor old fulla to death.
Ma says she’s got her doubts about old Mrs G bein a widow though. Reckons she just turned up one day with a little baby on the mail truck. They was on their way to Cobar. She was waitin outside the store while the truck refuelled and she saw a sign lookin for help in the store and she went in and next thing ya know she’s workin in there and livin in the old flat out the back with her baby girl.
One day, about five years later, a big, flash car turns up and a couple of old whitefullas in fancy clothes gits out and goes and talks to Mrs G. Next thing ya know she’s buyin her own house and sendin her little girl off to some fancy school in the city. Ma reckons they come and bought her off.
Aunty gits her bloomers in a right twist over that. Reckons it’s no one’s business and when Ma says, ‘if she’s a widow then my arse is white,’ Aunty’s eyeballs pop out and the veins in her neck near burst.
Anyway, Aunty likes to say real loud in the grocery section that she’s just ‘ducking’ round the back to visit ‘her friend’ Mrs Garraway.
Old Mrs G’s real skinny, with stiff purple hair that don’t move. Not even when she’s walkin in a willywilly. Dad reckons even a cyclone couldn’t move that hair. She’s got a long, thin face and a nose to match. Her skin’s kinda grey coloured, and she wears black skirts and twin sets in winter and brown skirts and white cotton shirts done up at the collar in summer. It don’t matter how hot it is, she always wears stockins and lace-up shoes.
No one’s ever seen Mrs G laugh, smile or cry. Only thing she does is raise her left eyebrow sometimes. And Aunty Pearlie gits that eyebrow workin all the time.
When me and Antman visit, we like to go down to the store with Aunty Pearlie. We specially like bein with her when she goes to see old Mrs G. She always snaps at us to behave ourselves and not ‘touch anything’ or interrupt her when she’s ‘talking’.
Anyway, last time we was home we went with her. We helped her with the groceries, then we went out the back so she could visit Mrs G. Aunty Pearlie sweeps into the store like a big old black queen and says in her most hoity toity voice, ‘Good morning, Mrs Garraway. How are you today?’
‘Very well, Mrs Johnson. And your good lady self?’ says Mrs G.
Aunty Pearlie grows a coupla feet on account of Mrs G calling her a lady and says, ‘I’m doing as well as can be expected in this hot heat. It must be around 40 centimetres in the shade. But thanks for asking.’
Mrs G’s eyebrow shoots up. ‘You’re very welcome, I’m sure. And I have to agree, the heat is rather enervating.’
‘You must be more used to it than me, Mrs Garraway, I just find it drains the life clean out of me. Anyway, did you hear the Flying Doctor come in this morning?’
‘Yes I did. I believe...’ Mrs G starts.
But Aunty cuts her off. She likes to be the one tellin the story.
‘Well,’ says Aunty, ‘they came for Old Norm Hunt. He went to the clinic the other day and they sent him home with some aspirin. Said he had the flu. Anyway, his wife took him up to the hospital at two o’clock this morning and Sister Chapman radioed the Flying Doctors and they reckon he had all the simpsoms of remonia and sent a plane to fetch him straightaway.’
Mrs G’s left eyebrow shoots up again and she says, ‘Yes I heard he had pneumonia. Very dangerous thing to have is pneumonia.’
‘Yes. Old Mrs Mac died from remonia last year,’ reckons Aunty.
Me and Antman were about ready to bust out laughin but we held it in. We knew the show wasn’t over.
‘So, Mrs Johnson. What can I get for you today?’ says Mrs G.
‘Well,’ says Aunt, ‘I’ve been thinking about making myself some new frocks for summer, so I’ll need to look at material. It’s so expensive to buy clothes and I used to be able to sew quite well in my younger years.’
So Mrs G gets down some material and Aunty makes a big show of lookin it over. Then she tells Mrs G how much she wants.
‘And while I’m here I’d better get a couple of reels of white cotting.’
‘I beg your pardon, Mrs Johnson?’
‘Sorry, Mrs G. I’ll have a couple of reels of white cotting, please,’ replies Aunty.
Old Mrs G’s eyebrow shoots up so far it nearly flies fair off her face, but she gets the white cotton reels and places them in front of Aunt.
It was too much for me and Ant. We run outside and fell down on the nature strip and just busted our guts laughin. Fleabag was jumpin all over us, joinin in the fun, when Aunt walked out with her packages. She stopped dead in her tracks and looked at us lyin on the grass.
‘Hmmppph,’ she snapped at us. ‘Just look at you lot. Lying around on the ground like a pack of mongrel dogs. It’s behaviour like that gives the rest of us Aboriginal people a bad name. Are you coming with me?’
We reckoned no. Said we’d walk home. She told us to suit ourselves and got in her car and drove off.
We got up and tried to catch our breath and was lookin in through the big old glass windows at Mrs G’s counter. She was shakin and wipin her eyes. Antman reckoned she must have had some bad news just after servin us and we opened the door to see if she needed help. When we got in we realised she wasn’t cryin. She was laughin so hard it was like she was gunna piss herself. We just turned round and left her to it. We run all the way home to tell Dad.
The water skiers
Me, Antman and Fleabag was in the river country visitin Antman’s mob.
We was stayin with Antman’s uncle, Old Billy Swindle. He lives on the riverbank with his dog, Kooru, and his goat, Mona Lisa. He was born there, under a tree. He aint never left. He’s got a little caravan to sleep in and a tin shelter that’s got a table, chairs, a kerosene fridge and a portable gas stove. He’s got a battery radio, a guitar and a dartboard.
Old Billy aint never had a job cos he don’t pay rent. He grows his own vegies, catches his own meat and fish and Mona Lisa gives him plenty of milk. If he needs cash he traps some foxes and sells the pelts. Everyone’s been tryin for years to git im ta go and live in town.
‘C’mon, Unc,’ all his mob says to him. ‘We’ll git you a nice little flat. Everything’s inside. Ya can have a little garden if ya want.’
He’s even run a coupla social workers off his camp with a shotgun in the past when they was tryin to tell him it would be best if he lived in town. He reckoned he’d be the fuckin judge of what was best for him. Those fullas got a bit windy of him after that and pretty well left him alone. Suited Unc just fine.
Seems Uncle Billy told em ta stick their flats up their arses. He reckons it’s livin in little boxes where ya shit and piss inside where ya supposed to be eatin that makes us blackfullas sick.
‘It’s no good for the old blackfulla ta live that way,’ he reckons.
And he’s probably right cos he aint been sick a day in his life.
Old Billy aint never married neither cos all the women he was ever with wanted to live in a house in town. They wanted him ta git a job too. But he wasn’t havin any of that. He don’t like bein back-chatted either, and he reckons women can’t help doin that. ‘Best ta leave em alone,’ he says.
Anyway, one day we was fishin for yeller belly with Uncle Billy. We was just sittin there real quiet when we hear these speed boats. They sounded like mosquitoes in the distance and then they got louder and louder and ya could hear fullas yellin and laughin.
Next thing ya know the boats are flyin past us at a hundred miles and hour, churnin the water up and frightenin the birds clean outta the trees.
Unc looks at us. ‘By the fuckinjesus,’ he says. ‘Those fullas have got the dust flyin now.’
Me and Ant looks at one another. Ant goes, ‘Ya not wrong, Unc.’
Nutha
time we was sittin round the fire with Unc, drinkin big mugs of tea. It was really early in the mornin and the mist was still hangin over the river. We was all real quiet, like fullas are when they aint been awake for too long. So anyway, we was watchin the fire and next thing we see this bull ant start walkin up this big twig. He keeps goin. When he gits to the top, he stops for a second and then throws imself into the fire.
‘Must have been jilted,’ Unc reckons.
‘Yeh.’
The show comes to town
Jackie White was the best truck driver around the back country. Never needed no help loadin or tarpin or tyin down the rig. Always delivered on time. Old Neville Jones reckoned he’d be fucked without Jackie drivin for him.
Never marryin or shackin up with anyone, Jackie was born, raised and still lived in the same house as old Mr and Mrs White, who died within a year of each other, leavin Jackie alone. Jackie wasn’t too flash on makin friends or hangin out with people. Preferred the company of Yodel, the Jack Russell terrier who always rode up front in any rig or vehicle Jackie was drivin.
Jackie was long and skinny and had skin the colour of a well-polished cowboy boot. Always wore baggy blue jeans, a blue denim shirt hangin over the jeans, cowboy boots and a battered akubra pulled down over a long, crinkled face. Jackie looked like most drivers and workers out in the back country, but the thing that set Jackie apart was the eyes. Bluest ones you ever saw. Like the colour of the ocean Jackie never saw and never wanted to see.
Jackie probably woulda carried on just like always, drivin trucks with Yodel, drinkin seven-ounce beers and beatin everyone at pool in the pub. But then the travellin country show come ta town.
One of the fullas travellin with the show was me cousin, Big Kev Moolbong. Big Kev ran a toffee apple and fairy floss stand. He’s a wiry little blackfulla, stands round five foot two, but Dad reckons he casts a big shadow. Big Kev is always neat as a pin in his polished cowboy boots with big Cuban heels, jeans always pressed and rolled up at the ankles, big flash belt buckle with a bucking bronco on it and shiny satin, fringed cowboy shirts.
Me, Antman & Fleabag Page 3